Season finale review: 'Homeland' - 'Long Time Coming': The mother and child reunion

December 22, 2014 3:37 AM

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A quick review of tonight's "Homeland" season finale coming up just as soon as I want lasagna at 10 at night...

I started watching "Long Time Coming" about 20 minutes behind the live telecast, and kept seeing two sentiments on Twitter as I tried to catch up: 1)It was awfully quiet so far, and 2)Did this mean some horrible shoe was about to drop?

There is nothing more frustrating than realizing you have devoted much time to a show that the showrunners have not thought through; ie, no endgame. No major thread, no true character development, no destiny. Only meandering plots, designed only to keep the viewer tuning in, to pay for a movie channel with only profit in mind. No artistic merit, no pride...only numbers on a tally. Seven, eight seasons of this shite??? No payoff for the audience.

It's not that the characters are written as being immature. An immature character can still be a fully dimensional character. The problem is that the integrity of the characters is not respected. If the writers need a plot point, the need for the characters to be true to themselves is subservient to the writers' needs to get from point A to point B. It's not a matter of what a character would do; it's about what the plot line needs them to do.

Jimmbo, yes. These characters are written as so immature, so simple-minded. There's Carrie's inane conclusion that you describe. And then there's Quinn abandoning his resolve to leave field work---a major life decision and one that he had presumably given a lot of thought to---because ... Carrie didn't give him exactly the kind of answer he wanted in that phone call? So off he goes on what appears to be an exceptionally dark and dangerous mission.

I don't think that would be a factor because the video of Haqqani blowing his nephew Ayraan's head off was put on Youtube. That is what stirred up all the medical students in Ayraan's medical school to go out and protest and Saul was clearly seen so the world already knows he was held captive. About the protest. We just saw something remotely similar in real life: Terrorist killing innocent students and the Pakistani citizens being pissed off royally about it. Of course in real life it was something like 164 kids and teachers-132 of them elementary school age kids-and not just one young early twenties medical student but the spirit was the same.

Ennoval-who-"can't-wait-for-season-5-four-exclamation-marks": That's some weak reputation management right there. You're supposed to at least try to blend into the forum community you're targetting....

From avclub: "I think it's the video of him in captivity that Lockhart & the rest saw. But I don't quite know how that would derail confirmation hearings." "You can't have a CIA director who was publicly pwned by a terrorist, both because it looks terrible and because it calls every action relating to that terrorist onto question"

I initially was a little disappointed in the "slow" and seemingly uneventful finale episode but as it has sunk in, I realize that this is the perfect set-up for next season. There are a lot of unanswered questions and story lines...ones that I am anxious to find out how the writers/showrunners address them in future episodes. I think the episode put great punctuation to an incredible and action packed season. I can't wait for Season 5!!!!

I absolutely love Homeland, but this season's finale was a real letdown. I kept thinking that maybe I was watching a different show, which also starred Claire Danes and had a lot of the same characters. All through the show I kept hoping that something would happen. Maybe a Haqqani representative breaks into Carrie's house. Or Carrie finds that her baby is missing, and a note is left in her crib saying that Carrie has to go back to Pakistan to find her. Or the guy in the park is really a spy with a message for Carrie. Or Carrie's mother turns out to be an undercover agent who had an affair with a member of the Taliban in the past, and now she can help Carrie to fix the mess she made in Islamabad. But no. Nothing happened. Nothing!

First I experienced "The Missing" finale. This was brilliant TV all season and then one of the most awful finales. Must have sounded good on paper but in reality. No. Now comes the Homeland S4 Finale and while it was a great season the most "head shake" experience in a long time. Spent too much time on new character, nothing much ocurred and it certainly did leave the viewer with much to care about for a season 5. Very disappointing.

It needed a minute or two less of Carrie crying and in its place a closeup moment on Dad Mathieson's park friend's pug. Other than that, I'm probably not as disappointed as some others here but yes, it was pretty slow after the last few weeks. On the positive side it didn't require nearly as much suspension of disbelief as last week's show. The plot points were very predictable however; my husband and I called out about a half dozen things that we thought would follow, and they did. At the end, at Adal's house, I expected Saul to be in a hot tub when she was invited outside to see him (I guess I was hoping for maximum weirdness).

This finale was so bad it reminded me that I miss Brody...and the bad old days of "is he a good guy OR a bad guy?"...C'Mon SHOWTIME...stop worrying about "The Affair" and tend to your (soon to be formerly) loyal Homeland viewers!

It was a very calm episode, but I actually liked it. The insanity of this show can be too much sometimes. I have no interest in Carrie's mother or brother. I hope they were only introduced so Carrie would realize she can have a real relationship and won't be abandoned by every man. The actress who played the mother and Claire Danes had very similar mannerisms and walk, I wonder if that was intentional? I'm glad Quinn didn't die, he's the only character I actually like at this point. The non ending was a letdown but this season has been much better than the previous few so I'm not too bothered by it.